What were those lights in the Phoenix sky?

Researchers still sorting out hundreds of witness accounts

June 19, 1997
Web posted at: 11:58 a.m. EDT (1558 GMT)

PHOENIX (CNN) -- When it appeared in the Arizona sky on the
night of March 13, it was witnessed by hundreds of people.
Neither researchers nor witnesses have yet figured out what
Arizonans saw in the event now dubbed "the Phoenix Lights."
But that hasn't stopped them from trying to puzzle it out.

Tim Ley and his family are among the hundreds of witnesses
who have come forward to talk about the Phoenix Lights. They
first saw the lights while looking north from their Phoenix
home.

Now, their recollections of what they saw have been
transformed into computer images, using a combination of
digital photos of the landscape taken by Ley and computer
drawings of the objects his family saw in the sky.

"When it finally got here and we realized this thing was
coming right over us, we really started getting antsy," Ley
said. Then, said he and his son Hal, it went directly
overhead in complete silence.
(53K/5 sec. AIFF or WAV sound)

Tim Ley said that when the right side of what appeared to be
a giant V-shaped craft passed directly over him, the left
side was a couple of blocks away.

His wife, Bobbi, who also saw the aerial light show, said the
size of the craft they saw was overwhelming. But, she said,
"It didn't seem threatening. ... When it was right overhead
and we couldn't hear a sound, it was like you're just
awestruck."

Jim Dilettoso of Village Labs, who has been researching UFOs
for 20 years, is in the process of reconstructing the
incident with a virtual reality model.

The Leys are among the hundreds of witnesses he interviewed
about the Phoenix Lights. He said he considers the family to
be "very reliable," and their data "very important," because
by their account they were so close to the craft.

While nobody knows for sure what the Leys and hundreds of
others saw, Tim Ley is sure his family will never forget that
night. He said it has changed his outlook on the UFO
movement, turning him from a "polite skeptic" to someone
quite open to the experiences of UFO believers.
(133K/12 sec. AIFF or WAV sound)

"We just re-experience it every time we tell it," said his
wife. "It's like it was just yesterday. We've never seen
anything like it."

Reporter John Hook of CNN affiliate KSAZ in Phoenix
contributed to this report.